NIST e-NEWS(Vol 62, Apr 15, 2009)

Clubs at NISTElectronics Hobby Club: Innovate to ImplementThey say- “No Country is Foreign, No man is strange, beneath all uniforms aSINGLE body breathes…” When we feel the rhythm of life, we dance. Whenwe hear it speak to us, we listen. We go where the music takes us. No matterhow incredible it may be or what consequences it may have for our lives. For thosewho haven’t tried that yet, you will be amazed at what an adventure life suddenlybecomes, what knowledge you can access, grasp and understand, when you go withthe flow and cease to wage war with it for fear of being different. For most people so often the head gets in the waybecause they fear stepping outside of convention. They fear what other people will think and say about them. Buthow can we expose the unthinkable unless we think the unthinkable? Are we saying that we know it all? Is therenothing left to know? Of course there is. We know only a fraction of it all. And what has been the force that hasbrought us even to our current state of knowledge? Those who have dared to think and communicate the unthinkable.Without such people the human race cannot evolve. It just runs on the spot, living within a perpetual prison of themind. What was that they said? Humans will fly? Ridiculous! That we can travel beyond the speed of sound?Crazy! That we can create babies in a test tube and clone the human and animal species? Ludicrous! Yet all andmore have been done by those who have thought the unthinkable while the masses mocked.And Electronics Hobby Club (EHC) has just been another small but significant step in the list.The Club started with a great inaugural spark by Dr. Ganapati Panda, HOD, ECE, NIT, Rourkela, on 19 th March2007 & from then the club never looked back.With faculty advisors as Mr. Rajesh Kumar Dash & Mr. M. Suresh whose dedication that can be matched onlyby a few and Chief Patron our Director, Prof. Sangram Mudali, for whom Impossible is I’m possible, the clubaccelerates with no bounds.Electronics Hobby Club (EHC) has always given the platform for those who ventured to go beyond the conventionaltheory in the field of electronics. Either be it the Hardware competition in ‘Sankalp’ or be the celebration of‘Electronics Month’ or be the performance in ‘Techfests’ across India, EHC always carried the tag of success.EHC has also implemented many electronic gadgets in NIST like ‘Electronic Bus Schedule’, ‘Automatic ElectronicBell System’, ‘Electronic Smart House’ to list a few.Electronics Month was a milestone with EHC organizing events throughout the month for the first time by anyclub in the history of NIST. It has given students a uniform platform for all streams toparticipate, learn and to prove themselves in hardware.In the time of economic recession when the IT sector is shrinking, a culture of electronichardware has been inculcated among the NISTians.It started with ‘Electronics Dexterity v1.0’ (Electronics Quiz) with a huge participationof 400 students from 2 nd , 4 th & 6 th semesters. The club organized a workshop named‘Electrokriti’ for selected students of 2 nd and 4 th semester in two different phases of 3days (12hrs) each. The selection for workshop was done on the basis of performance in the quiz. The workshopaimed at basic electronic components, basic breadboard prototyping, power supply fundamentals using bridgerectifiers, use of 555 timer in different modes, use of 4017 decade counter & soldering practices involving LDRsensors and comparator IC LM358. Unbelievably a 100% result came out with more than 110 perfectly workingprototypes on breadboard & APB. The feedback from the students need no other certification for emergence ofEHC as a pioneer club of NIST.EHC gave its third touch with ‘Electronics Design Contest’ .With a participation of 83 students which nearlyknocked the record of Sankalp. Adding to that the students of 2 nd semester were highly praised by the judges as itwas hard to imagine about circuit making caliber and the enthusiasm in the 1 st year itself. Respected Principal ofAPEX institute Dr. Ramesh Chandra Das visited on that day and got amazed about the culture of NIST inelectronics hardware.National Institute of Science & Technology, Berhampur, 761008 17 of 18